aśouni

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Attestation:	VB·27 (aśounị/atekua) (1)
Status:	probable
Language:	Celtic
Word Type:	proper noun
Semantic Field:	patronymic
Grammatical Categories:	gen. sg. masc.
Stem Class:	o
Morphemic Analysis:	ad-obn-ī (?)
Phonemic Analysis:	/adou̯nī/ (?)
Meaning:	'of Aśounos'

Commentary

See the inscription page on the reading.

Genitival patronym from a personal name aśounos (Lejeune 1971: 52, Lejeune 1990: 71), whose analysis is unclear.

Ferrero 1897: 59 compared CIL V 6902 asonio, asoniae in Caluso, Liguria, but ⟨s⟩ as equivalent of Lepontic ⟨ś⟩ is only plausible when the underlying sound is a tau gallicum type cluster/sound. The traditional explanation connects the name with Gaul. CIL XII 3215 axiouno (dat., Nîmes), under the assumption that san can denote the outcome of palatalised /χs/ (cf. naśom, amaśilu), see Danielsson 1909: 28, n. 3, Rhŷs 1913: 52, Lejeune 1971: 63, n. 200, Tibiletti Bruno 1978: 153, Morandi 2004: 567, Uhlich 2007: 385. As Stifter 2010: 371, 373 notes, aśouni would be the only good example for this value of san (see further on Ś), provided that the comparison with axiounus is pertinent. The latter, however, is itself obscure (cf. Stifter 2024b: 132). Stifter alternatively suggests to analyse the name as ad-obno- 'causing great fear' with san for /d/ and development of -obn- > -omn- > -ou̯n- as in exounomara (or possibly with PC Lautstand, see esopnos). The formation has an exact OIr. correspondence in adomnán, but the analysis is rendered somewhat problematic by the fact that -obn- is always attested with /b/ in Cisalpine Celtic (esopnos, esopnio, exobna, two of these from the same find place as aśouni), with /m/ in the Latin inscriptions of northern Italy. Cf., however, esonius; the formation with ad- may also come from a different stratum or dialect. Again differently Delamarre 2007: 28, who proposes ad-sou̯no- 'dreamer', but sou̯no- 'sleep' is not well attested as a name element (pace DLG: 272).

See also Villar & Prósper 2005: 328, Prósper 2002: 206-208.

Bibliography

CIL	Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. (17 volumes, various supplements)
Danielsson 1909	Olof August Danielsson, Zu den venetischen und lepontischen Inschriften [= Skrifter utgivna av Kungliga Humanistiska Vetenskaps-Samfundet i Uppsala 13.1], Uppsala – Leipzig: 1909.
Delamarre 2007	Xavier Delamarre, Noms de personnes celtiques dans l'épigraphie classique. Nomina Celtica Antiqua Selecta Inscriptionum, Paris: Errance 2007.
DLG	Xavier Delamarre, Dictionnaire de la langue gauloise. Une approche linguistique du vieux-celtique continental, 2nd, revised edition, Paris: Errance 2003.
Ferrero 1897	Ermanno Ferrero, "Iscrizioni di Chignolo Verbano", Atti della Società di Archeologia e Belle Arti per la provincia di Torino 7 (1897), 56–60.